


nothing here to stop us (when we're up for it)

by homoerotvic (arcticmoltres)



Category: The Wilds (TV 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Basketball Captain Toni, Cheesy, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, F/F, Good Girl Shelby, Internalized Homophobia, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, but maybe some of them will make small appearances, no beta we die like jeanette, not everyone is going to be in this fic, tropey
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-12 19:40:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28515840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arcticmoltres/pseuds/homoerotvic
Summary: Everything starts on the afternoon when she (rightly) punches Andrew in his stupid fucking face.A slow burn, enemies to lovers, high school fic where the things they're most afraid of might be just what they needed.Or what happens when the gay basketball captain rebel and the """totally straight""" perfect christian girl fall in love.Oh, and also contains, for some reason, a bunch of references to High School Musical.
Relationships: Shelby Goodkind/Toni Shalifoe
Comments: 36
Kudos: 303





	1. give the bruises out like gifts

Everything starts on the afternoon when she (rightly) punches Andrew in his stupid fucking face.

It’s a beautiful September sunset when she sees them from afar, and at first, she believes her eyes must be deceiving her; surely, there’s no fucking way that’s Andrew fucking Walker in a Whataburger parking lot making out with her fucking girlfriend with his fucking hand down her pants in the front seat of her car.

For Toni, anger starts like a tingling in the back of her head; it’s difficult to control and leaves her vision white-hot and blurred. In that state, usually things come out of her mouth without her explicit permission, proven many times by the fights she would have with her foster parents, siblings, best friends, cashiers, customers, police officers, coaches, teammates, herself (in the shower), whatever piece of furniture she stubbed her toe on, to name a few. Sometimes, even her body moves without her telling it to – it’s famously why you shouldn’t piss her off during basketball games. She’s noticed, though, it seems the key to making that tingling go away is attached to her knuckles – so when she feels angry, she punches, she breaks, she destroys, until it’s all settled and the anger is gone.  
Usually, by then, the clawing, angry, red feeling in the back of her head is replaced with a quiet, purple guilt around her throat.

But on that chilly, even pleasant, Tuesday afternoon, when she comes closer and realizes that it’s actually Andrew and Regan making out in the front seat of her car, it all comes down with a crash. A literal one, too, as her schoolbag smashes through the back window, small shards flying everywhere.

“What the fuck!” “Shit!” , they both shout at the same time.

She’s around the car in a flash, opening the passenger door, and pulling Andrew out by his collar. She looks into his surprised eyes; the first punch goes straight to his nose, and the second is on its way to his left cheek, when he manages to grab her arm and deliver a swift hook to the side of her jaw. She presses him up against the side of the car, and with a firm knee to the middle of his legs, he falters and grunts in pain against her. She feels his weight give and manages to deliver a few blows to his head while holding him up, not that she thinks it will make any difference with the way he probably has enough brain damage to spare.

Over his head, she catches Regan’s eyes, open, scared, worried, upset, worried about Andrew, upset at her. Distracted momentarily, she doesn’t at all see the two-handed blow to her gut coming, and for a second, all her breath seems to leave her body; it’s enough for Andrew to push her away, and she stumbles and falls back on her ass. It’s a little embarrassing. She’ll probably leave that part out when she retells this to Dot later.

Andrew now has time to get back in the car, and Regan promptly speeds off. From her place on the ground, Toni manages to catch a handful of gravel and chuck it at the car, although all the little pieces fall a bit lamely a few feet in front of her.

By now, the sun has already set; the sky is still bright, but the streetlights start to light up, one by one, with a quiet hum. Toni is left in the fluorescent parking lot, body and mind aching, as the adrenaline and rage leave her system. This time, she might not feel guilty, but she definitely feels sad.

Pulling her knees up to her chest, she looks down at her hands. The left one, next to the right one, already starting to swell up. She wonders how she thought she might run away and marry this girl someday, and how their hands seemed to fit perfectly together. She thinks of all the shit she’s been through for her. And she thinks about how she never gets to have anything good – it’s all always taken away by the same people. The same, exact people.

She doesn’t know how long she’s sat there thinking, but it’s enough time to leave her head in a buzz, buzzing like the wasp nest next to her old camping site, buzzing like the phone on the kitchen table that always goes unanswered, buzzing like the streetlights, buzzing like a beer bottle that hits the ground but doesn’t break, just spins, and spins, and spins.

And it’s with her mind like a particularly resistant beer bottle, spinning, buzzing, covered in green, that she makes her way to her house that night. Buzzing, spinning, but unbreaking.

-

The thing about Tuesdays is that the next day is a Wednesday. And Wednesdays fucking suck. The weekend feels an eternity away, and Toni has Biology class at 9 a.m.

Dot notices her swollen hand and bruised jaw while they eat breakfast and puts a little bit of ice inside a plastic bag to give her, but doesn’t say anything. It’s only on their walk to school that she says “You know, I can’t keep pretending to be your mom and faking ‘disciplinary warnings’ signatures forever”.

“Well. You might be right, but I can assure you he deserved it this time. I doubt he will tell on me for this, though”, Toni responds, keeping her eyes on the sidewalk in front of her.

“Who even was the poor bastard?” Dot asks.

Toni opens her mouth to answer, but it turns out she doesn’t need to. At that point, they’re approaching the school and Andrew is out of his truck, kissing his girlfriend, Shelby Goodkind, goodbye. When they part, it’s glaringly obvious that one of them has a very purple nose, and it’s glaringly obvious that the girl with the very swollen hand might have had something to do with that.

“Oh.” says Dot, “What did he even do?”

“Um.” Toni runs her hand through her face. She really doesn’t want to talk about it ever again, but whatever, it’s Dot and she deserves to know about this. “I caught him kissing Regan. Kinda lost control a little bit, fucked up his nose, as you can see. Fucked up her car, too. Totally did not fall on my ass.” She throws the bag of water that used to be a bag of ice into a trashcan nearby. Nice toss, three-pointer. She does a little discreet fist pump.

Dot pauses. “Yeah, that’s Andrew for you.”

“On the bright side,” Toni spins on her heel, facing Dot now, and bumps into her shoulder, “with a broken nose, maybe he’ll be needing some painkillers. If you know what I mean.” She wiggles her eyebrows and smirks.

“C’mon, keep your voice down, dumbass.” Dot says, smiling all the same. “Also, you know that I’ll be running out soon – if anything, this will only speed up the process.”

The truth is, that was a situation they would both need to deal with soon. Ever since Dot’s dad died, selling whatever medicine he had left was her only way of income, and she didn’t want to spend all of the little inheritance he left for her at once. The meds were running out, so Dot and Toni had been looking for some other way of making money, part-time jobs, that kind of thing. Long weekends by the computer, looking for small things to do or places that would be willing to hire students.

Most of the time, they both felt like outlaws, hiding from the system of social workers that were supposed to be helping them – being so close to turning 18, anyway, they didn’t really want any of that. God knows that Toni had lived in enough different houses and had her fair share of foster parents, and Dot didn’t want to leave everything she knew, everything she had left of her dad, all of a sudden. She could survive, she knew that. And Toni had also been proving herself incredibly resilient ever since she ran away from her last foster home.

“Speaking of, I’m going to that smoothie place later. I think I can adjust my practice times around their shifts.” Toni remembers. That was where she was yesterday, before the whole shitshow with the shithead and Regan.

“Alright. I’m thinking of dog-walking,” says Dot, “who doesn’t like dogs, right?”

Thinking of the only dog Toni ever had a close relationship with, a French bulldog belonging to one of her foster families that drooled all over the place, Toni answers, somewhat sceptically, “Right.”

They’re walking down the main hall now, and it’s almost time to part ways. The usual people they see at the school are telling each other about their summer holidays, the places they visited, the girls they kissed, the parties they went to. Toni does pass some of her friends, who salute her as captain, people who high-five her and who she really did miss over the holidays. Dot fades into the background, as she’s used to and quite frankly prefers, until they’re past the thick of the crowd and approaching Toni’s classroom.

“Dude, I still can’t believe we’re not in Biology together this year. It’s gonna be so weird.”

“I know, but think of what happened last time you didn’t have a partner in Biology.”, Toni tells her, bringing up the time they first met. “Think of how shitty your life would be if you’d never met yours truly”, she shines a teasing smile.

Dot laughs at that. “Good luck, punk”, and shoves her lightly into the classroom.

Unfortunately, that’s when she crashes right into this girl who’s taking the first row seat, spilling both their books to the floor. They both crouch to pick them up, and around them the classroom starts to fill. It’s only when Toni raises her eyes to apologize that she realizes the girl she bumped into is actually Shelby Goodkind, blonde hair, green eyes, perfect smile, and all.

“Uh. Shit. Sorry.”, Toni wonders if this can ever get more awkward.

Shelby’s eyes shine at her. “It’s really no problem. Clumsy me!”

They both get up, and Toni realises she’s been holding her breath. She doesn’t know if she should be getting ready for a fight. Shelby doesn’t look like the type to try and punch her or anything, but she could still try to poison her, or pretend Toni hurt her, or stab her with a mechanic pencil and claim innocence and everyone would believe her, or something psychopathic like that.

“Uh, I’m gonna go,” Toni begins to say, but -

“Wanna be lab partners?” comes the interruption, Shelby still smiling. Extremely confused, a little dazed (Shelby actually smells really good?) and mostly desperate for a way to escape, Toni’s eyes search the room. Every other table is already occupied, the teacher is one foot through the door, and that’s when she realizes she doesn’t really have a choice.

Actually, that’s how everything starts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sup. this is my first real attempt at this fanfic thing, although ive dabbled here and there.  
> ive got a bit planned! not sure how long it will be, but get ready for a slow burn. i really fell in love with shoni and yeah, wanna explore it.  
> i hope that you like this! if you wanna talk, i'm homoerotvic on tumblr and twitter and basically everywhere :^)


	2. not in the swing of things (yet)

Toni doesn’t really understand why Shelby even wanted to be partners with her - she’s still suspicious that this is a very elaborate ploy to kill her when she lets her guard down. Shelby keeps smiling at her every time she glances over, even when met with a frown. “What the fuck are you smiling about?”, she whispers, but somehow that only makes Shelby’s smile grow.

“I think we’ll make good friends,” Shelby whispers back.

Toni scoffs, “Your boyfriend might have something to say about that.”

Shelby looks confused. For the first time, her smile falters and she frowns, “And just why would he?”

Toni realises then that for the same reason that Andrew won’t tell on her for punching him, he won’t tell Shelby what really happened. So she doesn’t know, after all, that Toni was the one to temporarily rearrange her boyfriend’s facial structure.

At least that explains why she was being so nice.

Well, kind of explains it. Who the fuck is that nice and says shit like “we’ll make good friends” to people they don’t even know? Toni reaches a simple, glass with 50% content of water and 50% content of air conclusion; even if Shelby is, in fact, a psychopath, at least Toni herself appears not to be a target at the moment.

Toni’s about to tell her all about yesterday when the teacher, in fact, not deaf or blind to things happening 5 feet in front of her, tells them to close their mouths and pay attention. Granted, Toni still tries to rekindle the conversation as soon as Ms. Henderson turns her back, but Shelby seems to have taken the scolding very seriously and won’t even look at her, much less give Toni her undivided attention. The teacher tells them about their project for the semester, a deep dive into a topic of their choosing, so she has to wait until the end of class, when they’re picking up their stuff to move on to the next period, to talk to her again.

“Know that big, ugly, purple thing your boyfriend’s got for a nose?” Toni says, closing her notebook and placing her pen in her back pocket.

“Yeah, he tripped over and fell face-first into his bible,” she smiles, “poor thing.” Shelby stacks her books and gets up, starting to go around the tables on her way to the door.

Toni genuinely laughs at that. “Yeah, no. He’s lying to you, you know. He fell face-first into this right here,” she shows off her left hand, “because he was kissing someone he shouldn’t be kissing. If you know what I mean.”

Shelby frowns. To Toni’s surprise, she doesn’t look sad, or devastated, or betrayed, or any dramatic shit like that. She looks more confused than anything, like she’s solving a math problem or like she just realized she left her laundry in the washing machine and now it’s gonna be all stinky and she’ll have to do it all over again.

“I thought I should tell you, well, he’s cheating on you,” Toni continues.

After a few more moments of awkward silence, in which Toni almost asks if Shelby’s still listening to her, trying to meet her eyes, “No, I don’t think he would do that,” she concludes, moving out of the classroom.

“What? I’m telling you. I punched him because I saw him kissing my girlfriend.”, Toni follows her through the door, tugging on Shelby's arm to turn her around so she can face her. Shelby’s eyebrows jump at that, coming back down to a slight frown.  
  
Unfortunately, Andrew has spotted them, and is snaking his slimy, terrible arms around her waist, going “Hey, babe, lemme walk you to second period?”, not in the least acknowledging Toni’s presence.  
She, however, does acknowledge his smarmy existence with a well placed, “Hey, asshole, tired of sticking your tongue into anything that moves?”

Andrew laughs at her, and puts his lips right over Shelby’s ear, “Why are you wasting your time talking to her? Do you really believe anything she tells you? You do know she’s…” and the rest he whispers in her ear, but Toni’s been through this enough times that she knows exactly what he’s saying, especially with the shudder going all over Shelby’s body. Right. She guesses the “Goodness” and “Kindness” of Shelby Goodkind only goes as long as you’re a god-abiding heterosexual.

Toni really can’t afford another school warning, but in that moment, she really doesn’t give a fuck. She’s about to lurch towards Andrew and give him a few good reminders of yesterday when someone grabs her by the armpits and pulls her away, not unlike a child venturing too far from their parent's watchful gaze.

“What the fuck, Dot! Let me go!”, Toni kicks, and flails, but Dot loves her survival TV shows and is holding her exactly like she would hold an alligator or bear or snake or any other kind of feral animal which Toni could probably be compared to right now.

“Nope. No way. Need you to go to the smoothie place later, and you can’t do practice, work, and be in detention at the same time. Just relax. We’ll be in maths in no time.”

Any form of resistance is obsolete as she’s dragged away. She crosses her arms, and digs her heels on the school floors – if she will be carried, she will at least be carried as obnoxiously as possible, the rubber of her sneakers making a horrible screeching sound down the corridor.

As she is taken, she notices that even though Andrew is still laughing and dragging Shelby away by her hand, those deep green eyes haven’t left her.

* * *

Later that day, Toni does go to her shift at the Smoothie Factory. It's clearly an old establishment trying to pass as a hip-new-age spot - there's wood paneling everywhere and string lights that spell " _smoothies_ " behind the counter, like they couldn't even think of something more creative than that.

She’s only been there a couple times, but she’s already starting to realize why no one wanted the evening shift she chose to take. Her co-worker was this other 17 year old called Fatin, excessively rich, and by her own account only working there because “God wants to punish her”.

Yes, Toni did ask what for. Not that it’s any of her business, but work gets boring when the customer influx slows down.

Fatin said something like “I was too powerful”, which sounds like bullshit and like she doesn’t want to share that it was something way simpler, something along the lines of “my rich family wanted me to have some form of contact with regular people so I would stop being a spoiled brat”. And that’s exactly what Toni told her. Fatin merely gasped in mock insult and asked if she was an Aries. That’s when Toni officially gave up on any normal attempt at communication.

Anyway, the trouble with Fatin wasn’t even her snarky remarks. Quite frankly, Toni had to hold her laughter in sometimes after a particularly sarcastic observation about a costumer or a meme she read out loud. The trouble with Fatin was that, well, she didn’t do shit.

Most of the time, she sat in the back, drinking diet strawberry milkshakes and browsing Twitter. Occasionally she would be “shook” about a celebrity Toni didn’t really recognize being involved in a scandal or some shit like that. It was like having a constant news announcer telling her about irrelevant things she didn’t care about.

(Except that time Fatin told her about how this basketball player she had heard of started dating one of those weird make-up guru millionaires and ended up being accused of stealing shit from his house. That’s exactly why Toni doesn’t trust rich people. Crazy fuckers.)

Either way, Fatin wasn’t much help at work. So Toni basically ran everything by herself, which was fine, because the movement wasn’t crazy.

However, that did culminate in Toni being at the counter when Shelby walked into the store.

“What the fuck.” Toni murmurs, looking around for help. “Hey, Fatin,” she tries to call, nodding her head frantically and suggestively towards the cash register. Fatin merely lifts her eyes off of her phone from her spot on a chair, with her feet up on another chair, and her bag on yet another chair next to the last two chairs.

“Can you, just, can you,” she tries to explain, but Fatin raises both her eyebrows in incredulity, or maybe just pretends she doesn’t understand Toni’s request, and goes right back to scrolling.

Recognizing a lost battle, Toni rolls her eyes, and putting on her most neutral expression, which probably still looks like a scowl, she says, in her most monotone voice, which probably still sounds like she’s being very rude, “Welcome to Smoothie Factory. How can I help you today.”

Shelby smiles at her, “Well, good evening to you too, partner,” she tries, “and hello to you over there,” looking at Fatin, who offers her a little wave but no other form of acknowledgement.

Upon being basically ignored by both of them, Shelby turns her head a bit to the side, sighing through her smile, and puts her hands on her hips. “Anyway, I came here to see you, since we didn’t really have the chance to talk after class.”

What. Toni’s rethinking her conclusion about this girl being a psycho. “How would you know where I work? We hadn’t even talked before today,” she asks, rather bluntly.

“Oh, I asked this girl I know from my dad’s gym. She’s also on the basketball team, you know, and she told me you would be here. I just wanted to schedule something so we could start working on our project. It’s important that we start soon, anyway, and I don’t have your number, so…”, she trails off with an awkward laugh, waving her phone a little bit.

“Okay, but we literally have class again on Friday. Why didn’t you just wait until then, instead of basically stalking me all the way here?” Toni confronts.

“Stalking? I’m hardly stalking you. This town is so small.” Shelby frowns a little bit. “And anyway,” something seems to click, “of course… I also wanted a smoothie.”

Toni looks at her, incredulous.

“Hmm… how about… I’ll have the banana cinnamon chai one, please”, she hands her the money.

Toni can’t help but let out a bark of laughter. Who would have known she would want the most basic flavour they had?

(Toni. Toni would have known.)

“Of course you are,” she says, putting the ingredients into a blender.

“Now, what’s that supposed to mean?” Shelby asks, looking a bit annoyed for the first time since they met.

“That’s the most basic flavour we have,” Fatin unexpectedly announces, seemingly reading Toni's mind, while the latter pours the smoothie into a cup. She gives her an eggplant-coloured straw because she figures that’s the ugliest colour they have here.

Shelby finally drops her smile. “Look, I can see that you have some type of problem with me. I won’t pretend that I enjoy your presence, or aggressive tendencies, either. Just give me your number so we can start and finish this project as soon as possible and I never have to think about you again.” She offers her phone in exchange for the (basic ass) smoothie.

Toni scoffs at that. “Let me give you some advice. When you ask a girl for her number, maybe don’t start with how much you don’t enjoy her presence and personality”, she gives an ironic smile.

Hearing that, Shelby flushes, momentarily losing her footing, looking down and tightening her grip on her newly made smoothie. Her crucifix necklace shines brightly, reflecting the stupid backwall lights. Just as Toni expected.

“And, if you want to stop pretending, you might as well stop pretending that those are the only ‘ _tendencies’_ of mine that you disagree with.” she concludes.

There is a pause, as Shelby swallows. Her eyes dart around the place and she notices that Fatin is now paying full attention to this conversation. She expects the girl’s gaze to drop back to her phone as they make eye contact, but much to her surprise, Fatin stares at her right back and Shelby is the one to actually break.

“Toni, I… really don’t hate you, alright? I just… you have to understand that our worlds are so different, and I’m," She takes a breath. "Well, I’m not here to discuss this with you right now, am I?” To be fair, Shelby does sound pretty sheepish, flustered, even.

For some reason, Toni kind of subconsciously takes pity on her. All her instincts are still telling her to fight, to argue, to insult the girl standing in front of her – except, this time, she doesn’t feel the rise of anger she’s accustomed to. The tingling at the back of her head doesn’t come, which confuses her, as she expects her body to react in the way she’s used to.

Instead, she nods, and shifts her attention to the phone in her hand. It’s a brand-new iPhone, much unlike the beat-up Android she carries around, with a cracked screen and all. She quickly types in her number and names the contact ‘shali-FOE’, with the basketball and explosion emoji, and gives the phone back.

The weird uplifting feeling she gets when a little smile forms on the other girl’s lips doesn’t make any sense, and she doesn’t like that very much. So, just for habit’s sake, she says “By the way, you’re a total bigot, as well as a brainwashed little sheep, controlled by an obsolete form of patriarchy who’s convinced you there’s an all powerful dude watching your every move so that you only do exactly what they tell you to do.” 

Shelby blinks at her. “Maybe being watched all the time is better than not being seen at all. Have you thought about that?”

With that, she spins on her heel and walks out, not before saying “Goodbye!” over her shoulder to Fatin.

Toni frowns and takes in what just happened.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” she asks Fatin.

“Maybe she’s like… really into voyeurism, or something,” Fatin laughs.

Toni chuckles at that. The rest of the shift is pretty uneventful; by closing time, she checks her phone and realizes she has 2 unanswered texts.

_Regan <3 (6:35 pm): _Let’s please talk?

So much has happened today that Toni hadn’t even considered the conversation she would have with Regan. She’s so exhausted, and any conversation would lead to a fight, anyway – she thinks that breaking Regan’s rear window was enough, at least for now.

_Babe_ :) _(7:_ _46 pm):_ no. nope. never speak to me again.

She tabs out of that conversation and opens the other text.

_[unknown] (7:03 pm):_ So tell me when you’re available, later

_shali-FOE (7:47 pm):_ how about never?

_Shelby BadRude (7:50 pm):_ Sooner we start, sooner we finish.

_shali-FOE (7:50 pm):_ whatever. mayb on sunday then?

 _shali-FOE (7:50 pm):_ i mean if u don’t have mass or smth lmao

_Shelby BadRude (7:51 pm):_ Very funny. Sunday afternoon should be fine for me

_shali_ - _FOE: (7:52 pm):_ it’s a date then.

 _shali_ - _FOE: (7:52 pm):_ oops sorry didnt mean to make you _uncomfortable_ or anything

Shelby doesn't answer for a long time after that, so Toni finishes her shift and goes home. When she plugs in her phone before taking a quick shower, she notices she's got a new message.  
  


_Shelby BadRude (9:14 pm):_ I’ll see you on Sunday.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so first of all! i do not dislike Regan and i thought their romance was very cute. however sometimes a girl needs characters to advance her plot. sadly Regan is playing that role for now.
> 
> second of all. i've been kind of obsessing over this fic atm, but classes are coming up again soon so chapters might be somewhat longer but not as regular in posting (I guess these first two chapters were more like a first chapter split in two). my bad. im just a sad little college student boo f-ing hoo
> 
> thanks for the comments so far, this community is really cool, and i hope u enjoyed this one!
> 
> come talk if u want, im homoerotvic on tumblr n twitter


	3. shards beneath our feet (but it wasn't my fault)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's been a very, very, very, long week for Toni.

Toni knew she eventually had to talk to Regan.

That didn’t mean she wasn’t trying to avoid that conversation for as long as possible, though.

It’s not that Toni wasn’t angry anymore. Her problem here was possibly that she was _too_ angry, so much so that she couldn’t even bear to think about what had happened, much less process it – she felt like she was walking around in a haze, still seeing through a filter of blue ever since that evening in the parking lot.

So throughout the next day, she dodged texts, calls, and hastened her pace when she saw Regan approaching. She asked Dot for cover, pretended to be really late going somewhere, and even hid behind a trash can, once.

However, by the time basketball practice came along, and Regan was standing between her and the gym she inevitably had to enter, she knew the time for the dreaded conversation had come.

Looking straight into Regan’s eyes, Toni pushes her way past.

“Toni, you know that we need to talk,” Regan states.

“We have nothing to talk about,” Toni responds.

“There’s things I need to say to you. I can’t leave us like this,” Regan pleads.

Toni stops in her tracks.

“Yeah. Except you already did. You left us like this the moment you decided to cheat on me.”

She takes a deep breath.

“What the fuck, Regan? Why would you do that, just why would you do that to us? Were you not happy? Haven’t I been good to you?” Toni snaps.

She’s really trying to keep her voice down, to be calm, reasonable, but the familiar tingling is arising, and she can’t help but to just let it all out.

“Fuck, I… when you told me you loved me, it was like I was _finally_ awake. It felt like seeing color for the first time, whatever that fucking means. I _trusted_ you! And you were… _screwing_ this fuckboy behind my back for how long? How _fucking_ long, Regan?!” She’s shouting, at this point, as she looks at Regan, hands balled into fists, starting to shake.

“Fuck, Toni, I made a mistake.” There are tears in Regan’s eyes as she says it. “I made a stupid, stupid decision and I’m so sorry. Of course you made me happy. Of course I loved you, I still do, I love you, it was only one time and I don’t feel anything for him, I -”

“Then why?” Toni interrupts, voice rough, “Why would you ruin us like that? We’d talk about running away, out of this backwards fucking place, like, _all the time_. Is that not what you wanted? You promised me, Regan, you -”

“That’s exactly why! Toni, you have all this fire in you, you’re like a storm. And when you say things like that – things like running away together, I believe it. Fuck, I believe it because I know you would do that in a fucking second. I think a week ago, if I told you to, like, fucking marry me or something, you would have. Even though we’re 17 and it’s not even legal, you wouldn’t have rested until you found a way.” Regan continues, although she is fully crying now, and her voice is strained.

“And that’s what I love about you. You’re unstoppable. But I’m _seventeen_ , Toni, and I’m scared. I don’t know shit. I don’t know how I want to live my life forever. I can’t tell you that I know for a fact that I only want to be with you for the rest of it. That’s crazy, that’s a crazy thing to say. Life isn’t a fucking movie! I - I guess I just keep imagining myself, 40 years old, sitting with a wine bottle in my hand after our divorce, and regretting not exploring and enjoying the possibilities when I was young. The thought of that scares me so much.”

“What?” Toni exclaims, “ _What?_ Who even said anything about marriage? You’re thinking so far into the worst possible future that you’re completely losing sight of where we are now! You’ve traded something _so good_ for what? A possibility?” She opens her arms, exasperated.

“I would have done anything for you, I would have, you just had to talk to me, and we would – we would have found a way!” Toni’s voice is calmer now, “You just had to talk to me, not go behind my back and… and screw me over like this, make me feel so stupid for believing the things you told me, I –“ There were tears in Toni’s eyes as well, but she wouldn’t allow herself to break down. Not like this.

A few moments pass as some tears escape Toni’s strongest will, eyes burning - they’re just looking at each other. Toni’s chest is heaving, and the air grows thick with the static of their frustration.

“You’re right,” Regan concedes. “I know. I know I should have talked to you, but I panicked and I made a mistake and Toni,” Regan reaches for her hand, “I’m really, really sorry. Just please forgive me. Even if this is the end for us. I couldn’t disrespect what we had – more than I already did, I know, without at least apologizing.”

Toni looks at Regan, holds her hand in her own. She thinks that, for all of the times her heart’s been ripped out of her, this is the first time she’ll do it herself. She knows that it would never be the same – she could never trust Regan the way she once did.

“I forgive you,” she lets go of her hand, “but we’re done.”

Regan nods, and wipes off some tears that had collected on her own cheeks. She does the same with one of the rogue drops that was rolling its way down Toni’s cheek, down to her jaw. Toni feels her warm hand wiping it off, brushing over the still tender and purple spot where she was punched.

“I hope you’ll find someone who can love you just as ardently.”

Just like that, and with one last look into waterlogged eyes, they turn around, and go their separate ways.

“Fuck,” Toni says, under her breath, as the tears finally roll free. It hurts so bad, _so fucking bad,_ like someone has reached into her chest and squeezed all the air right out of her lungs. She makes her way to the locker rooms with her head down, hands still shaking, avoiding any curious looks from anyone who might have been early to practice. As the captain, she was usually the first one there, and thankfully, that seems to be the case today, as the locker room appears to be empty.

Toni opens the tap and soaks her face in the freezing water, gripping the sink with so much force that she thinks either her fingers or the stone countertop will end up breaking. As the penny drops, beyond all the despair she feels, she guesses it was better to know why, what was going through Regan’s mind. The churn of anger and sadness deep in her stomach seems to fill her body with a restlessness that she needs to sweat out, and she knows what she wants to do.

She really wants to play basketball.

Practice goes really well, at least. They’re all in sync, managing to practice some crazy plays that they want to try out for the next games of the season – it’s really exciting, and Toni distracts herself for that small period of time, focusing all her emotion on the sport. When she’s on the court, she’s free. With a basketball on her hand, she can just do her best, acting on instinct and with the confidence of someone who has put in hours and hours of practice. She never lets them down. She brings them the wins.

And not that she’d ever admit it, but - it’s kind of the only place where she truly feels important.

In the locker rooms, one of the point guards, Leah, approaches her.

“Shelby Goodkind was looking for you the other day. I told her you’d be at work, so. I hope that’s alright.”

“Yeah, she found me,” Toni drapes her towel over one shoulder. “We’re doing a biology project together. I didn’t know you two were friends.”

“My parents are kinda intensely religious, so I’ve known her basically all my life. Never really had much in common, though. To be honest, all I know is that she’s really into pageants and God,” Leah says.

Toni didn’t know about the pageants thing. Not that she’s surprised.

She gives Leah a little smile. “That makes sense. That’s pretty much all I know about her as well.”

“Maybe you’ll get to know each other more over the biology thing”, Leah suggests.

“God, I hope not,” Toni replies.

Leah laughs at that. “Yeah, well, good luck.”

“Aaa-men to that.” Toni singsongs. Leah laughs again, and Toni steps into the shower.

* * *

Friday morning comes and Toni finds herself in Biology, yet again. Turns out time doesn’t stop just because you’re going through the worst heartbreak in History, unfairly enough.

The previous night had been filled with ice cream and a rewatch of the High School Musical trilogy, on Dot’s assertion that Toni deserved a night of relaxation after such a stressful week. Nevermind that it wasn’t even the end of the week - Toni felt like, emotionally, she had been through at least two years on the span of the last three days.

Anyway, she totally did not cry on Dot’s lap during “Gotta Go My Own Way”.

(Dot smelled a little bit like a dog – guess that’s the issue with her new gig. She loved it, though, and already felt an emotional connection to every ‘good boy’ (and girl) in the neighbourhood. In her own quiet, supportive way, she showed Toni pictures she’d taken on the walks to cheer her up even before Toni had told her what happened. The High School Musical and ice cream idea was what followed that specific recollection of events.)

The only downside to last night was that she had a really bad case of earworm when it came to “We’re All in This Together”. So that’s what she was humming, mindlessly, when Shelby slipped on the chair next to her.

“High School Musical, huh? Guess it makes sense that you like that movie.” Shelby quips.

“Oh, really. Why’s that.” Toni clips back. She’s really not in a good mood today.

“Well, there’s a lot of basketball in it.” Shelby says in a mildly teasing tone.

“Hm. Guess it makes sense that you like it, too. There’s a lot of annoying blonde people in it.” Toni deadpans.

“How would you even know if I like it or not? Also, there are, like, two blonde people. And, besides, I’ve heard there are many folks who think Sharpay and Ryan are actually the most talented, yet simply misunderstood.”

“Wait, two blonde people? Did you deadass just forget about Troy Bolton?”

Shelby rolls her eyes. “Excuse me, Troy Bolton isn’t _blonde._ Having highlights is _not_ the same as being blonde.”

“I can’t believe we’re seriously arguing about this. Troy is clearly blonde. He’s also clearly annoying. So you two have a lot in common.”

“How is Troy annoying? He’s just, like, clearly stuck between a rock and a hard place. He wants to sing, his dad wants him to play basketball, what can he do?”

“Literally both of those things. It’s not even a big deal. You can sing and play basketball, those aren’t, like, mutually exclusive” Toni frowns, “he doesn’t have to be all whiny about it all the time.”

“Well, it can be real hard to go against what people expect of you. Him doin’ something he loves and getting over the shame of that put on by his teammates and his dad is quite brave, in my opinion.”

“Yeah, well,” Toni retorts, “I’ve gotten over the shame of doing things I love without throwing myself on every wall I see at school. Also, can I just say, I want a giant poster of myself in the hallway. Why don’t we have that here?”

Shelby sighs, “Fine. I see your point. Troy can be annoying at times, but he’s in no way, shape, or form, blonde. He’s also the basketball captain,” Shelby smirks, “so it’s really you two that seem to have some things in common.”

Ah, so Shelby does find her annoying. She’s about to point this out, when a third party joins their quite important, and private, conversation.

“Since you two are so interested in this subject, Ms. Goodkind and Ms. Shalifoe, why don’t you research the roles of genetics in phenotypical characteristics such as hair coloration?”

It’s the second class of the semester and the second time the teacher’s practically told them to shut up. Toni thinks that maybe that would register to Ms. Henderson as a sign that they shouldn’t be working together and decides to request a change of partners at the end of the class; she eyes her desk and nods to the biology teacher’s words. In her peripheral vision, she can see Shelby turning red as a steam-cooked beet.

“Great! Guess your subject matter is decided, then. You can discuss it all you want for the rest of the semester.” Ms. Henderson turns around and resumes her lecture on the main differences between eukaryotic and prokaryotic cells.

“Awesome. Wonderful subject you got us”, Toni whispers to Shelby.

“Shut up. You’re gonna get us both in trouble,” Shelby whispers back.

Toni huffs loudly, and the teacher looks at her in disapproval. She decides to take this loss and wait until the end of the class. However, the lecture is _super_ boring, and she’s kinda mad, so she quickly becomes restless. She reaches over to write on the corner of Shelby’s notebook: “ _this is all ur fault.”_. Shelby doesn’t fall for it, doesn’t even look at Toni, just drags her notebook away from the middle of the table and keeps on taking notes.

Toni is very bored. Boredom increasing by the second. Bored bored bored.

“We’re all in this together” is still stuck in her head. What a terrible day she’s having.

Without realizing, her mind drifts off - she goes into basketball planning mode, thinking about upcoming games, tactics, field positions; moves that she needs to practice, the possible rankings her team can get. She doesn’t even register that she’s absent-mindedly tapping her foot to the rhythm of the damned song until her partner complains.

“Stop that,” Shelby whispers.

Toni speeds up the tapping.

“Seriously, Toni, stop it,” Shelby repeats.

Toni looks at her with a face that says “make me”, and starts alternating the taps, creating an obnoxious staccato.

Shelby swiftly kicks her under the table.

Toni gasps. “Is that all you got?”, she whispers, and taps along.

Shelby looks challenged. They start a not-so-friendly game of footsie under the desks – Toni tries to catch Shelby’s foot under hers to stop the kicking. It’s getting really intense and she’s _this_ close to winning when the teacher loses her patience.

“If the two of you can’t behave in class, maybe you should take a few minutes outside to calm down.”, she demands. 

* * *

Shelby looks _devastated._

“I’ve never been kicked out of class before. Why can’t you just… _chill_ for two fucking seconds?”

“Say your prayers with that mouth?” Toni retorts.

“I don’t know what your problem is with me. I’ve been nothing but nice to you, and you’re just so mean all the time, like, what in the world is your _damage_?” Shelby doesn’t slow down.

“What’s my damage? I’m sure you would just _love_ to know my damage. In fact, I’m sure you’d be ecstatic to share my damage with the whole school.” Toni’s already grumpy today, and this turn of events is not working to improve that at all.

“I’m sorry if I don’t believe your ‘niceness’ for a single minute when you have absolutely no reason to be nice to me. You should hate me - I’m a known _homosexual,”_ she says it in a stage whisper, for added drama, “and I punched your boyfriend, for fuck’s sake.”

“I don’t _need_ a reason to be nice to you. I believe that people should be kind to everyone they meet – you never know what someone might be going through.” Shelby says, almost patronizingly, which just spurs Toni on.

She lets out a bitter laugh. “Ah, yes, the ‘love thy neighbour’ bullshit. Yeah, right. I bet you have a field day thinking about all the different ways you could ruin my life.”

“You bet on that without even knowing me, and for that reason, you decide you’re going to make my life miserable instead?” Shelby asks.

“You’re the one who wanted to be lab partners with the girl who punched your boyfriend.” Toni bites back.

“I didn’t know you’d punched him!” Shelby exclaims.

Wait. “I thought you believed his bullshit about falling into a Bible.”

Shelby sighs. “Do you really think I’m that stupid?” She shakes her head. “Never mind, don’t answer that. Of course I don’t believe him.”

“You don’t?” Toni _really_ doesn’t understand what’s going on now. “So you either think I go around making up lies and punching people out of the blue or you don’t care that he cheated on you. I honestly don’t know which is worse.”

“You don’t know anything about my life.” Shelby starts walking away from her.

“Uh. Yeah, I think I do, though. Perfect house, perfect family, perfect looks, perfect boyfriend. You two look like a Corn Flakes commercial. I’ve never seen a couple so _flawless_ as the two of you.” Toni follows behind. She knows that she’s being mean, but she’s having a really bad week and everywhere she goes _this girl_ seems to appear to annoy her into her next life.

Besides, Toni doesn’t believe that _anyone_ could be nice and chipper like Shelby is without it being at least a little bit fake. She wants to see how far she can push, poke the bear, until it wakes and rears its ugly head - bears are very cute until they’re pissed. Not that Shelby’s cute. Not at all. Anyway. Toni’s getting distracted by this metaphor.

“Will you stop bringing _him_ up every ten seconds?” Shelby exclaims, not looking back at her.

“Why? You don’t wanna accept that he’s cheating on you?” Toni keeps on poking the metaphorical bear.

“It’s really none of your business, though, is it?” Shelby’s starting to look aggravated.

“Perfect little boyfriend, kissing every girl who even looks at him for more than two seconds. That’s gotta be bad for the ego,” She’s inside the metaphorical bear’s cave now, and the stick is getting shorter and shorter.

“Stop it, Toni, I seriously -” Shelby says, through gritted teeth.

“Jeeesus. You really ought to have some self-respect. Otherwise, it’s just depressing – I don’t even feel like insulting you anymore.” Toni might as well ask the metaphorical bear how he likes his metaphorical sticks at this point. Definitely gone too far.

“I just don’t give a _fuck_ _about_ _him_ , alright?” Shelby snaps.

There’s a pause as she realizes what she just said. 

“Shit. Shit, no, no, I didn’t just say that.” She nervously smiles in incredulity at herself, shaking her head.

She definitely _did_ just say it, though.

“Wow. Then why the fuck are you still with him?”, Toni asks her.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. He’s a great guy,” she says through an extremely strained smile, and continues walking. Toni doesn’t follow, this time.

She lets out a low whistle. “Damn. That’s some fucked up shit you’ve got there. Good luck with all that.”

Shelby laughs bitterly, but doesn’t stop walking. “Like you’re so much better. It’s like you’re making it your personal case to harass me – you’ve clearly got some ‘fucked up shit too’ – normal people don’t just heckle innocent bystanders like you do.”

“Hey, at least I’m honest about it.” Toni states, now walking backwards the opposite way.

“Yeah. Yeah, you are.” Shelby shouts, because they’re at a significant distance from each other now, “Being honest is easy when you’ve got nothing to lose!”

“Sure is,” she nods. “Sure _fucking_ is!” She opens her arms and twirls, facing forwards now.

The end of the day seems light years away.

* * *

Toni doesn’t know how, when, or why she starts venting to Fatin, of all people, but she does.

Well, no, she does know _when_. It must have been around 7 p.m., one hour before closing time.

“Oof. And here I was, thinking my week was bad.” Fatin comforts her when Toni ceases her uncharacteristic word-vomit.

Toni sadly nods, sitting down on one of those rotating stools at the countertop and burrowing her face in her arms.

“Know what’ll cheer you up, though?” Fatin sounds excited.

She sadly shakes her head, although the movement is limited by her biceps on either side of her skull. She hears some doors opening and closing. Pots being opened, and finally, a loud whirring noise.

Hey, maybe it’s one of those little medical saws they use in the movies and Fatin is coming to finally end her suffering.

… Nope, no luck. Fatin just made them some chocolate milkshakes.

“You know you still have to pay for those, right?” Toni’s muffled voice rings out from beneath her arms.

“Of course,” Fatin replies, getting started on her shake.

Toni follows suit. It tastes pretty good, but then again, it’s hard to miss with a classic like that. The sugar kicks in and Toni does, surprisingly, feel slightly more chipper.

“I need your opinion on something, Fatin,” Toni sips her milkshake. “Troy Bolton. Blonde. Correct?”

Fatin stares at her like she’s crazy. “No. No way. Troy has brown hair with highlights – that’s _so_ not the same as being blonde.”

Toni frowns. Is the entire world colorblind or something?

“You people are all crazy.”, she concludes.

“Been having this discussion a lot?” Fatin teases her. “Good to see you occupy your mind and time with the stuff that really matters,” she chuckles.

“Shut up,” Toni says, but not with much bite to it. “I still think he’s blonde. And annoying.”

Fatin taps a bit at her phone. “Well, you’re wrong. I just checked the wiki and here it says ‘chestnut brown’ hair.” Fatin shows Toni her phone. It does, indeed, say that.

But it also has the _amazing_ introduction of “Troy is the captain of East High Wildcats basketball team, the most popular and cutest boy in school.” Toni decides to open the wiki on her own phone, screenshotting that part of the page and sending it to Dot.

“I didn’t even know there was a High School Musical wiki. What’s up with that,” she chuckles.

“What do you mean? There’s a wiki for literally everything.” Fatin smiles. “By the way, I know you play basketball, so tell me when you have a game, I wanna go watch. I’m really into athletes,” Fatin winks at her.

Toni laughs. “Thanks, Fatin, but I feel like I’ll be out of the market for a while.”

Fatin laughs, too. “No, I didn’t mean you. No offense.” She cocks her head, smirking. “But you’ve got to have some teammates, right?”

“Right. Although I am the captain, so that automatically makes me the ‘cutest’ and ‘most popular’,” she jokes. “I don’t know if they can compare”.

“You, my friend,” Fatin says, moving to start closing the shop as the clock hits 7:50, “have got a point.”

They gather their stuff and lock the doors. The parking lot outside is almost empty, and the air still has some winter bite to it. There are, however, some shadowy figures loitering about a dark red truck that catches Fatin’s attention.

“C’mon, this doesn’t look too safe,” she tells Toni. “I’ll give you a ride home.”

Sitting on the passenger’s side, listening to some Top 40 bullshit, Toni thinks that Fatin really isn’t so bad. Even though most people will just disappoint you all the time, some of them still manage to surprise you.

“Why did you have a bad week?”, Toni decides to ask Fatin.

“What?” Fatin glances at her, sideways, as she needs to stay focused on the street in front of her.

“When I told you about everything. You said you had a bad week,” Toni explains.

“Oh, nothing much. Family drama. Cello performance coming up.” Fatin tells her.

“I didn’t know you played the cello. That’s cool, I guess.”

“I’ll show you, someday. You can come to the performance, if you want. Since I’m going to your basketball game.” She shifts a bit on her seat, getting more comfortable.

They fall back into an amicable silence, and Toni is surprised at how easily this friendship came to be. Fatin is so different from her – it really shouldn’t make sense, but somehow it does.

Resting her head back on the headrest, watching the streetlights pass, Toni feels alright.

* * *

That’s _not_ how she feels on Sunday. Not in the least.

The study session with Shelby was going as expected: terribly. They’ve whisper-argued many times already about the best spot to sit in _(“Let’s just sit over here, there’s a nice bit of sun coming in,” “It’s too hot over there,” “But it’s too cold over here,” “Wouldn’t be if you actually wore sleeves”, “Oh, I’m sorry, now you don’t like the way I dress either?” “I didn’t say that,” “Yes, you did!”_ ), about why they use capital letters for dominant genes and lowercase for recessive ones _(“It’s like they’re saying the bigger you are, the more power you have. That’s horrible,” “You’re just saying that because you’re a 5’4 basketball player,” – Toni really had to hold it together on that one)_ , and even if Shelby believes in Science or not _(“Of course I do! I’m a Christian, not a medieval peasant”, “Oh, but gay people should still be burned to death?”, upon which Shelby said she needed a water break and walked out of there)._

The worst fight, though, was when Toni told her that she’d asked the teacher to change partners for the project. The teacher told her no, unexpectedly, called this a ‘learning opportunity’ for tolerance and for their professional future, and ushered Toni out of the classroom - so it wasn’t like it had made a difference anyway.

But Shelby seemed really hurt, then, more than Toni had become used to when they bickered.

“Wow. Do you really hate me _that much_ that you can’t even stand the idea of doing a silly science project with me?” She asked.

“Well, I,” Toni stopped to consider. “I don’t know, no, it’s just, we obviously don’t work well together - we’ve spent the entire morning on this and only wrote, like, one paragraph of actual research, because we can’t get along.”

“Maybe that’s because you don’t miss any opportunity to insult me,” Shelby pinged.

“Maybe I insult you because I hate it when people are passive-aggressive with me,” Toni ponged.

“Maybe I choose to be ‘passive’ because I have better things to spend my energy on rather than on fighting, as opposed to _some people.”_ Ping.

“See! That’s exactly what I’m saying! Just say what you mean and say it to my fucking face!” Pong.

“Stop _yelling._ You’re gonna get us kicked out of here.” Shelby deescalates.

God, Shelby frustrates her _so much_. Toni groans, gets up her off her chair (noisily dragging it on the floor, to the librarian’s discontentment), and walks out of the library. She really doesn’t know how they’ll get through this project without killing eachother.

Toni had been texting Dot incredulously about every argument they seemed to manifest out of thin air. So when she came back home, huge headache, almost no progress on the actual project, Dot was in equal parts sorry for her and merciless in her teasing.

“Oh boy, what a mess you got yourself in, huh. And you were the one saying all that shit about how being alone in Biology is what brought me to you and all,” Dot laughs.

“Yeah, yeah, lay it on.” Toni throws herself on the couch, putting her legs on top of Dot’s lap. “I know I’m also being a pain in her ass, but I can’t help myself. It’s so _easy_ to be a bitch with her.”

“That’s understandable. I’ve been walking her dog, Tucker, and let me tell you. Huge fucking house, the full suburban wet dream,”

Toni sits up. “Don’t tell me Tucker’s a…”

“Golden Retriever,” they say at the same time.

“Yup. Right on,” Dot laughs.

“Oh my God.” Toni snickers. “I didn’t know that kind of people _actually_ existed.”

“You can find anything here in the grand state of Texas”, Dot says in a corny accent. “Her parents are kind of intense, though. Church-bake-sale-soccer-mom intense,” she considers.

Their eyes meet then, a bit sadly. What’s left unsaid over the low noise of the TV is clear: better having too much than nothing at all. Both of them have had such similar experiences when it comes to this, and spend so much time together in their current living arrangement that many things don’t even have to be put into words – a look is more than enough.

“Even so, that explains a lot about her, I think.” Toni concludes. “I just don’t know how we’ll be able to do this without _literally_ killing eachother,”

“You just gotta hold on – you’ve been through worse. Do your work, try not to be too mean, play basketball, survive,” Dot advises.

“I guess,” Toni responds. “Playoffs start in about a month, speaking of.”

“How are you feeling about that?” Dot casually asks, half distracted with the TV.

“Pretty good. Think we can bring it home this year,” Toni smiles. “We’ll throw a raging party. Even more raging than when we lose. It’s gonna be amazing.”

Dot laughs. “I hope so.”

Looking out the window, Toni watches a red truck pass on by.

Work. Basketball. Survive.

Toni thinks she can manage that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im sleep deprived!  
> ok well i love writing their fights because the tension is just so fun. lets let them let it all out. the plot will be advanced soon.  
> i hope all of you have watched high school musical.  
> thats it thats the post
> 
> catch me on tumblr @homoerotvic


	4. glad that we stopped kissing the tar on the highway

She manages that for exactly two weeks.

Those fourteen days went by in a nice routine for Toni, which felt like a deserved break after the chaos that had been her life.

Basketball had been good – Toni was feeling more and more like her team was focused, improving, with a real chance of winning this year. They had even started to practice some cool rehearsed moves, involving the whole team. The only thing better than winning is, after all, winning with style. Toni had been staying later and later, and practice only ended when they were thoroughly exhausted.

She’d been talking to Leah a lot, who stayed afterwards to help tidy up the court and put away the balls. Of course, that often ended with a late-hour game of H.O.R.S.E., competing for bragging rights and sometimes for the choice of the warmup routine next practice, but overall it was nice to get to know Leah better.

They’d share their favorite music, often playing from Leah’s phone, and Toni was surprised to learn that Leah really liked classical music, as well as literature, and decided to ask Fatin if she could bring Leah to the cello performance Fatin had invited her to.

Work had also been pretty nice. Her and Fatin grew closer and closer with each shift, learning to appreciate eachother’s senses of humour and inclination towards chaos. They’d make up stupid challenges, like daring the other to only speak in questions or in a very bad British accent to the next few customers. Of course, every challenge was taken very seriously, as losing meant some kind of punishment such as filming a TikTok dance (for Toni) or giving the other temporary control of the loser’s account (for Fatin).

Once, they bet the whole tip jar on who could speak only in rhymes for the longest – and, to be fair, Toni only lost when a customer asked what was on the Immune Support Supreme smoothie and Toni couldn’t find a rhyme for “orange”. She tried to argue that it was a setup, but it seemed that the poor old man who asked the question really couldn’t read the menu three feet in front of him. A little worried for his safety, Toni had to accept her defeat.

The winner was fair, however, and spent the money on a nice little bottle of whiskey. Toni had never tried it before, usually sticking to beer or bottom-shelf vodka, and was a little bit apprehensive; but she wasn’t one to chicken out of anything. So one day, after closing, they made spiked chocolate milkshakes and stayed in one of the booths, sharing stories about their lives and plans for the future.

Fatin told her about how she started playing the cello, how she doesn’t really feel the passion for it anymore, but knows that it will be useful for college and her academic future. Toni told her about how this season of basketball is important for the same reasons, but also how much she loves the sport.

Fatin told her about her parents, about how she used to get along so well with her mom as a kid, but now feels like only her dad truly understands her. Toni told her about how she ended up living in Texas after her mom died, when a friend of the family reached out to take her custody. She also told her about how she got kicked out and slept outside for a while before she met Dot, and how she lives with her now. It’s a very concise retelling of the story, but it’s still a lot more than she’s ever told anyone besides Dot. Fatin reaches out over the table and holds her hand, adding a few shots of whiskey to their empty cups.

Not long thereafter, they’re already laughing again, as Fatin tells her an anecdote about the first party she threw when her parents went away, how one of the (very expensive) Italian statues her parents owned got thrown off the roof and lost an arm – how they superglued a mannequin arm to it and how it took her parents five days to realise something was wrong.

And that’s when they get the idea.

After lot of running in the shadows to hide from cameras, some expert and unexplainable spy work, and a very, very close call with the mall cops, they acquired their newest co-worker: Marcus.

So ever since then, a headless, armless mannequin had been a part of their team. He’d sit in the back, next to the blenders and fresh ingredients, adorned with a Smoothie Factory apron (with a secret hole cut in the butt), watching, or, well, since he doesn’t have eyes, _presiding_ over the place.

They would, of course, try to hide him whenever the manager was nearby, and store him in Fatin’s car after closing for the day, but Marcus was a valuable asset in the workplace, as well as an attentive and ever-patient companion; or at least that’s what they’d say whenever someone asked “so what’s the deal with the headless mannequin?”

Last but not least, the biology project had been going as well as Toni could have hoped for. They had developed a mutual treaty to immediately end any conversation involving the ‘three G’s’: God, Gays, and G-rated Disney movies.

That doesn’t mean they didn’t find room to argue, though, as on the day when Toni found out that, since blue or green eyes are caused by recessive alleles, then that means that there was a whole lot of incest in the past genealogy of any light-eyed person.

Of course, she gleefully passed along this information to Shelby, who, of course, didn’t take it very well. Upon reading the article, she observed that it only mentioned blue-eyed people. Toni argued that green eyes are a consequence of mutation, and still recessive over brown eyes, so Shelby was essentially a by-product of incest _and_ mutation.

She didn’t expect Shelby to notice that Toni doesn’t have a widow’s peak, also caused by recessive alleles. But she fought back, saying that blonde hair was also in that category, and so there was still more incest in Shelby’s family tree. Shelby fumed, looked back at her laptop, and asked to see Toni’s earlobes.

Midway through a discussion on _why exactly_ Shelby wanted to see her earlobes, Shelby suddenly reached forward and tucked Toni’s hair behind her ear. When her fingers brushed against Toni’s cheek, her breath unexpectedly caught, stopping her mid-sentence. After a very brief pause, filled with some stammering by Toni, Shelby announced, victoriously, that Toni’s earlobe was attached to her skin.

It took Toni a short moment to understand that an attached earlobe meant a recessive gene, but, once she did, it was an all-out academic war to determine who had the most incestuous family history. Their joy in the discovery of new traits was only ever thwarted by the next one stacked against them.

In any case, Toni found studying much more satisfying once rivalry was involved. That ended up being one of their most productive study sessions, and their project was picking up steam, even if said steam came from their mutual frying of the other’s nerves.

But that sense of peace only lasted two weeks.

Two weeks before she got jumped on the parking lot behind the gym.

Practice had gone well that day. Toni had stayed behind to tidy up, as usual, but today Leah was busy and couldn’t stay to keep her company. So, when Toni walked out of the gym, bag and keys in hand, she didn’t expect to hear car doors opening and shutting quickly just outside of her view, didn’t expect the realization that the red truck she kept seeing was, in fact, Andrew’s red truck, didn’t expect that he would attempt some sort of revenge, and, well, didn’t expect to get jumped on the parking lot behind the gym.

The thing about getting jumped is that you only realize what’s happening after the first punch has already landed and your knees are already starting to give. There’s no time to give as good as you get, especially when you’re exhausted from practice, outnumbered, and two guys way bigger than you are holding you by the armpits.

When Andrew landed the first punch on her nose, calling her all sorts of ugly names, Toni realized she probably should have expected all of that. You don’t punch a guy like Andrew and go back to normal life as if nothing had happened. He and his friends already hated her for who she was, and she had given them another reason for them to beat the shit out of her.

But she had been punched before. Yelled at. Spat on. And she always fought back.

Toni pushes her body weight down and her legs up, trying to kick Andrew on his stomach. She tries to flail, to be let loose, to headbutt, but the guys holding her are strong, and they’re laughing, and mocking her, and she feels the blood dripping out of her nose and reality turns fuzzy, powered by adrenaline, but seeming to shut off at the same time. She hears a low buzz, rhythmic, constant. The world is spinning around her in pain, her stomach hit with a falling sensation, when the punches suddenly stop.

Andrew is speaking into his phone.

“What? I’m a little busy right now, Shelby,” he says, angrily. “Yeah, in _half an hour._ Fuck, you girls are so…” he seems to be interrupted.

Toni looks down, at the streak of blood down her shirt. One punch to the nose, a whole lot to the stomach, and as she’s held there, the pain seems to crystalize and her legs are shaky, and she hates feeling so fucking helpless.

She turns her head to the side. “Fuck you,” she tells the guy holding her by the left arm, who smiles, horribly, and hits her with a hook to the ribs.

“Mr. Gilberts? Tell him that,” Andrew’s interrupted again. His eyes widen.

“Shit, fuck, okay, Shelby, I’ll talk to you later,” Andrew pockets his phone and turns to his friends, “C’mon, we gotta bounce.”

“What happened, dude?” Right-arm dude asks.

“Just, fucking, we need to go,” they all run back to Andrew’s car, leaving Toni on the floor. She can hear the engine, the headlights, the sound of the wheels on the asphalt.

Toni crawls to a wall and sits up. Her nose hasn’t stopped bleeding, and her whole body hurts, but she places both hands on the wall and tries to push herself up, somehow. Her stomach turns and her head spins and she’s about to fall forwards when two hands catch her by the shoulder, holding her up.

“Easy there, Rocky, I’ve got you,” the person who’s helping her says.

Toni looks up. Shelby stands there like an angel, the light behind her lighting up her hair like sunshine.

Toni thinks they must have really fucked her up if she’s comparing Shelby Goodkind’s hair to sunshine.

“What are you doing here?” Toni mumbles, dazed and confused. “Leave me alone.”

“Not gonna happen,” Shelby wraps an arm through her middle, making their way back to the gym. Reaching the door, she looks for the keys.

“I don’t need your help,” Toni helplessly says. The keys are still gripped in her hand, digging into her skin. Shelby looks down at her fist.

“Give me the keys, Toni, let me help,” she says.

“No fucking way,” Toni replies, gripping the keys forcefully. “Leave me the fuck alone.”

“Give me, c’mon, just give me the keys,” Shelby starts to wrestle her, trying to reach her hand without letting her fall, as Toni wriggles her whole body away, holding out her hand as far as she can. Shelby pushes her against the wall, laying all her weight on her, and it hurts the already sore spots all over her torso, their faces now inches apart.

“Let me fucking help you,” Shelby’s voice is frustrated, but quiet, and Toni holds the keys as high as possible against the wall, eyes closed, head tipped back, still struggling against Shelby. It’s futile, as Shelby is taller than her, and easily reaches her wrist, pinning it against the wall, and trying to pry her hand open to retrieve the keys.

Toni keeps a strong grip, but as Shelby loops her other arm around her neck, up to her fist, and bends down her wrist, she’s physically incapable to maintain her hold and her hand snaps open, the keys falling to the floor with a loud _clink_.

For a second, they’re breathing heavily against each other, Toni’s head cushioned by Shelby’s bicep, wrist still pinned by Shelby’s other arm, their bodies pressed together. Shelby’s eyes look wild with adrenaline, and Toni feels her heartbeat against her own chest. She can taste the blood on her mouth and feel the cold wall behind her, contrasted so sharply with Shelby’s body heat.

Then Shelby rips herself away, bending down to get the keys. The sudden absence of the body pressing her own against the wall makes Toni falter, almost falling face-first. She reaches forwards, balancing herself against Shelby’s shoulder, as Shelby unlocks the door and drags Toni to the locker rooms.

There, she helps Toni up on the sink, giving her a few pieces of paper to stop the bleeding from her nose. Toni tips her head back against the mirror, closing her eyes.

“Why are you doing this?” Toni asks. “And don’t give me some ‘help thy neighbour’ bullshit. I know you don’t consider me your fucking neighbour.”

Shelby is looking for ice, finding it in a cooler nearby. She picks up a cold bottle of water as well, passing it to Toni, wrapping some of the ice around a basketball shirt discarded nearby. She takes some time to answer, before saying, “Toni, they could have killed you.”

“Don’t pretend that you give a fuck about me,” Toni scoffs.

Shelby comes to stand in front of her. “We might have our disagreements, but,” she frowns, “I wouldn’t want you to die, or get seriously injured. What they were doing to you was horrible. I don’t think anyone deserves that.”

Shelby doesn’t give time for her to answer. “Let me check your nose.”

Toni swallows and shuts her eyes when Shelby grabs her jaw, gently tilting her head up. She presses a few spots on and around her nose, softening up her touch when Toni hisses in pain involuntarily, turning her head around a little bit to examine it from different angles.

Toni opens her eyes, but quickly shuts them again upon seeing Shelby’s face this close. She can see every line, every freckle on her skin, every shade of green in her eyes, and it’s suddenly too much. She bites down, flexing her jaw.

“I hate your boyfriend,” she says, to fill the silence.

“I know,” Shelby says, quietly. “He can be a real dick sometimes.”

She finishes her examination. “Alright, I don’t think it’s broken or anything. Just keep applying ice and wait for the bleeding to stop.”

“Okay,” Toni says, opening her eyes and looking at Shelby, now. “Oh, shit, I got blood on your shirt,”

Shelby smiles, “Yeah, well, you got some shirt on your blood, so I think you’re worse off.”

Toni looks down, and yeah, her shirt has got some stains on it. Thankfully, it’s black, so it won’t be too hard to wash off. Shelby’s top, on the other hand, is a light pink, and the streaks of red on her right shoulder from their struggle for the keys are noticeable.

Toni reaches for her bag beside her. Opening it, she retrieves her spare training shirt from a tournament on freshman year, and hands it to Shelby.

“Here,” she says quietly, “so your parents aren’t worried you’ve veered off the path of Godliness to a underground fight club, or whatever.”

Shelby pauses. “Toni, your shirt’s all dirty! You should wear that, won’t your parents be worried sick?”

“Won’t be a problem. Trust me,” Toni lightly shoves the clean shirt against Shelby’s chest.

Shelby hesitates, but ultimately accepts, turning around to change her shirt. “Okay, close your eyes,” she says through a small smile. “And don’t peek.”

Toni looks at the ceiling, focusing on the shapes of the white fluorescent lights. The blood runs back into her nose, her mouth filling again with the metallic taste.

“Right, because I’m a lesbian, so I’m probably a pervert,” Toni provokes. “Isn’t that what you think? Well, this might be news to you, but we’re not sex freaks. Seeing your bra clasp or whatever won’t make me savagely attack you,”

The clean shirt falls over Shelby’s shoulders and she turns around, brow furrowed.

“No, Toni, that’s not what I think,” she deadpans.

Looking into Shelby’s eyes, Toni’s fight drains out of her. After all, Shelby did just save her from a very, very shitty situation. She nods.

“I can give you a ride home,” Shelby continues, making her way towards the door.

“No, I’m good. They’re gone, so there’s no need,” Toni answers.

Shelby nods. “Okay, then, I’ll see you around.” She’s going through the door, blond hair covering up the back of the shirt where it says “Shalifoe” in large, white, letters, over the number 3.

“Shelby,” Toni says.

Shelby stops underneath the doorframe.

“Uh, thank you.” Toni half-mumbles, eyes on the tiled floor in front of her.

Shelby turns and looks over one shoulder, “Yeah, no problem, Toni,” she says as she disappears into the gym.

Alone on the cold counter, Toni looks up at the ceiling again, feeling the stretch on her neck. She lays back against the mirror, squeezing her eyes shut tight, feeling the pain settle into exhaustion. There’s a walk home she needs to make, and she just wants to crash down on the sofa.

* * *

When she gets there, Dot is in the kitchen, cooking some pasta. It smells really good, of chopped bell peppers, onions, and garlic. She’s a great cook, with some experience, since she’s had to prepare meals on her own for a while. And although Toni doesn’t really feel hungry – only tired and in pain – she has to admit that the smell alone makes it hard to not want a bite.

She dumps her bag near the door, heading into the kitchen to steal a few chopped vegetables and get some ice. Dot turns from the stove to greet her, her expression changing from one of casualness to immediately concerned.

“Damn, what happened to you?” She asks, eyes wide.

“You won’t believe it,” Toni wraps some ice around a dish towel, “In the middle of practice, everyone started this choreographed dance using the basketballs. I didn’t know what was happening, when all of a sudden, basketball to the nose,” she sits down on a chair.

“It was super freaky,” she continues, tilting her head back to balance the ice on top of her nose.

Dot shakes her head. She leaves the stove and lifts the little ice-pouch from Toni’s nose.

“Is it broken?” She asks, swaying her head around to get a better look.

“No, I don’t think so,” Toni answers.

Dot pokes her in the nose.

“Ow! What was that for?” Toni sits up straight, covering her nose with ice again.

“You’re so dumb,” Dot turns back to stir the contents of the frying pan, and lets out a chuckle. “No, seriously, what happened? You really need to stop with this shit.”

“Aw, Dotty,” Toni coos. “You worried about me?”

Dot turns around, menacingly threatening her again, index finger pointing out.

“Okay, geez,” Toni laughs, before settling into seriousness again. “It was Andrew. He and his friends attacked me after practice today.”

“Holy shit,” Dot says, sadly, “I bet he’s looking way worse than you right now, then.”

Toni frowns. “Yeah, well,” she shakes her head, “I wish I could say that. But two of his meathead friends were there too, and they were pretty fucking strong. I couldn’t do anything.”

“What a fucking coward,” Dot turns the heat lower and lets the pasta boil, sitting in front of Toni. “I’m sorry, dude.”

“It could’ve been worse. But here comes the kicker,” Toni continues,

“I’ll get my knee shields, then” Dot (very badly) jokes,

“You’ll never guess who saved me.” She really won’t, because Toni doesn’t let Dot guess. “Shelby _fucking_ Goodkind.”

“What?” Dot looks like someone just told her that Bear Grylls has vowed to never drink his own piss ever again. “How? Why? What?” She shakes her head, eyebrows widening and then furrowing confusedly.

“Yeah, my thoughts exactly,” Toni laughs. “I don’t know, one second they were beating me to a pulp, the next Andrew gets a call from her, bounces, and she’s right there in front of me, trying to help. I have no idea why, though.”

“Jesus. That’s the last person I would’ve expected.” Dot rests her head on her hand. “Maybe that was her random act of good-kindness for the day.”

“I guess, but I don’t know. I really thought she hated me.” Toni tilts her head back, again. “And not just because she’s a homophobe, but also because I’m a total pain in her ass.”

“You’re a pain in everyone’s ass,” Dot smiles. “That’s why everyone loves you.”

“Kinky,” Toni laughs. “The pasta smells really good, by the way,”

“Right, I bet you’re starving after all of that,” Dot smiles. “I’ll set the table, keep the ice going on there.”

Toni sighs. “I wish I had a bodysuit of ice.”

“We should get you into one of those ice baths. Make it standard for the basketball team while we’re at it.”

“I think they would literally beat me to death.”

“At least you’d have a lot of ice afterwards.”

Toni pauses. “Yeah, you do have a point,”

“Of course, I’m always right. And maybe more girls would magically show up to save you.”

“Shut up.”

Thinking about her situation just a year ago, Toni feels really happy, all of a sudden, to be sitting here with Dot.

They’ve got a really nice schedule of chores set up. Twice a week, Dot cooks something in a large quantity, that they freeze and eat during the week. Toni usually does the dishes. On the weekends, Toni’s in charge of take-out, and they’ve made a custom of Taco Saturdays and Pizza Sundays. Once a month, Toni does the heavy cleaning, while Dot vacuums and does the shopping.

What feels most important, though, is the company they offer each other. Toni feels really lucky. Even with the shitty parts of living alone at such a young age, she feels like she’s found family in Dot – someone to count on when nothing else in the world makes sense. And that’s more than she’s had for most of her life.

Attributing her sudden sappiness to the earlier physical trauma, Toni thanks Dot for the pasta and for being here. Dot, in response, fondly throws a piece of carrot at her, but Toni ducks and the carrot ends up on the floor. Nonplussed, Toni eats it anyway, to an exclamation of disgust and laughter from Dot.

Dinner is nice. They feel at home.

* * *

After dinner, Toni is lying on the couch, ice packs and frozen peas covering her nose and stomach, questioning her life decisions, when she’s startled by the buzzing of her phone on the coffee table. Reaching out one hand, she stretches her aching body until her fingertips touch the phone, dragging it closer to her and flipping it around to see who’s calling.

To her surprise, the screen is lit up with the default caller avatar, and the contact name “Shelby BadRude”. She picks up the phone and rolls out of the couch, running to the table where Dot is sat down, doing some homework. She comes to a stop, noisily slamming one hand on the table.

“What’s wrong?” Dot raises her eyes and asks, upon Toni’s manic disruption.

“Dude!” Toni shows Dot the still ringing phone with Shelby’s caller ID. “What the fuck? Why is she calling me?”

“How would I know?” Dot asks, looking back and forth at Toni and the ringing phone, as if watching a tennis match. “Aren’t you gonna pick it up?”

“I mean, I’m curious, but,” Toni’s panicking, phone buzzing aggressively in her hand. “She didn’t even text before calling. Who the fuck does that?”

“I don’t know, maybe it’s an emergency?” Dot considers. “You should probably answer it.”

“Okay. Fuck it. Here goes.” Toni touches and slides the green symbol, before speaking into the phone, “Uh. Hello?”

“Put it on speaker,” Dot mouths.

Toni nods, pressing the according button on her phone. Shelby’s voice rings out:

“… there. I, uh, just wanted to ask if you made it home safe,” she says.

Toni brings the bottom of the phone close to her mouth.

“Yeah, I did.” She furrows her brows, “Thanks for asking?”

Shelby laughs, a bit nervously. “Yeah, no problem.”

The line goes awkwardly silent.

They both start at the same time: “So, um,” - “Was there anything,”

Shelby and Toni laugh nervously, as Dot mouths “oh my god, idiots” shaking her head and covering her face in one hand.

“You first,” Toni grimaces.

“Okay,” she can hear Shelby’s sharp intake of breath over the line. “Well, I was going to say that we forgot about the small detail of your last name in huge letters on the back of this shirt.”

“Right.” Toni pauses, eyes narrowing, “I guess you wouldn’t want to be seen parading around with my name on your back.”

“No, I…” Shelby pauses. “No, of course not. But that’s not the issue, I was in my car. It’s just that I think my parents might’ve noticed, and I’m trying to think of a story right now, and I might need your help.”

“But I thought you were good at that, you convinced Andrew something was up,” Toni weakly encourages.

Shelby lets out a small laugh. She sounds kinda frantic. “Yeah. Unfortunately, convincing Andrew and convincing my parents of something are whole different ball games.”

“I see.” Toni nods. “And convincing your parents is basketball, I assume, so you’re asking for my advice?”

Dot facepalms again, but Shelby laughs a little at that.

“Let me think.” Toni taps her chin. “You could say that we had an accident during Biology and your pen exploded all over your clothes, so I gave you my shirt?” She proposes.

“Very creative, but my hands are completely clean,” Shelby declines, “Pen ink stains basically everything.”

“Alright, well, you could say that I spilled something on you?” Toni suggests. “Oh, and then Andrew, like, forced me to give you my shirt,”

“Oh, that’s smart. Something red, to explain the stains on my shirt,” Shelby excitedly replies.

Dot seems to get an idea, suddenly waving both her hands to get Toni’s attention. She runs to the door, reaches inside Toni’s bag, and retrieves a bottle of Gatorade.

“Yes! Genius!” Toni mouths back.

“Red Gatorade!” She exclaims into the phone.

“Ugh, gross. That’ll totally work, though.” Shelby agrees.

Toni’s surprised that’s something they can agree on.

“Right? Blue Gatorade for the win. But I guess sacrifices to my image have to be made,” Toni concedes.

“Right. Okay. Good plan.” Shelby concludes.

There’s a pause in the conversation, and Toni looks over at Dot with an inquisitive look, signalling “what the fuck do I say now?”. Dot signals back, with a shrug and noncommittal hand movements “I have no idea, you’ll have to figure this one out by yourself, I’m worse at this kind of situations than you.”

Toni suddenly realizes she still doesn’t have any idea of how Shelby managed to save her today, and blurts out, “How did you convince Andrew to leave, anyway? How did you know where I was?”

Dot nods, giving her an encouraging double thumbs up.

Shelby sighs. “I was supposed to meet him at school around that time so we could go on a date. I got there early, and was walking around to pass the time, clear my head,” she pauses. “Anyway, that’s when I saw what they were doing to you. So I called Andrew, said that I had to cancel our date and that Coach Gilberts was looking for him, heading towards the gym. That’s, like, one of the only people he’s afraid of, so I know he’d get out of there and leave you alone.”

With simultaneous head shakes and shrugs, Toni and Dot agree that it makes sense, but it still feels impossibly lucky that Shelby showed up. But even if she’s not used to fortune being in her favour that often, Toni’s not about to complain.

“Um. Thanks.” Toni breathes out. “I’m sorry that you had to cancel your date.”

The line goes awkwardly silent, yet again.

“It’s, you know,” Shelby starts, “I don’t really -”

“No, I know, but still, like -” Toni tries to explain,

“No, it’s, it’s alright.” Shelby interrupts. “I don’t,” she exhales, “really care… all that much.”

“Yeah. I know.” Toni says, and the call settles into silence once more.

A few seconds pass without anyone saying anything. They seem to stretch out, impossibly.

“Well… I guess I’ll see you around?” Shelby finally says.

“Yeah. Uh.” Toni doesn’t really know what to say. “Go wash your shirt before it gets infused with the blood of the sinners,” she tries to provoke, dramatically.

Shelby takes a beat.

“Fuck off, Toni.”

Toni is surprised by the attitude. She takes a moment to answer, “W- no, _you_ fuck off”, but midway through the sentence, Shelby’s already hung up.

The living room is silent.

“Huh.” Dot lets out a breath. “So that was something.”

Toni’s still standing there, staring at her phone. Dot sits back down, kicking her lightly on the shin. “Look at you. Helping those in need. I’m so proud.”

Toni sits down across from her. “I mean, she did save my ass. Least I could do was save hers.”

“Mhmm.” Dot smiles. “Sure.”

“God,” Toni rests her head on her arms. “Today was too much. Why do we only get so much peace,” she weakly pleads, to no one in particular.

“So are you guys, like, friends now?” Dot inquires, twirling her pencil.

Toni lifts her head up, looking at Dot straight in the eyes.

“I honestly have no idea,” she admits.

Dot smiles at her, sadly. “Good luck with that, buddy.”

Toni glances at her phone on the table. Reaching out for it, she changes Shelby’s contact name, and texts her:

_Toni S. (11:16 pm):_ so like

 _Toni S. (11:16 pm):_ do you think we could make purple gatorade by mixing red and blue gatorade?

Toni is already wondering why she even sent anything when Shelby starts typing.

“If you keep staring at your phone like that, it might catch fire,” Dot laughs from across the table.

“Shut up,” Toni replies.

_Shelby: (11:20 pm):_ That’s just grape Gatorade?

Well. She does have a point, purple Gatorade already exists. Toni feels kinda dumb now. She looks for the facepalm emoji.

 _Toni S.: (11:20 pm):_ fuck.

 _Toni S.: (11:20 pm):_ youre right lol

Shelby sends five ‘crying of laughter’ emojis. Way to rub it in.

_Toni S.: (11:22 pm):_ did ur parents believe the red gatorade story?

_Shelby: (11:23 pm):_ I think so. 

_Shelby: (11:23 pm):_ At least my mom did. She was all like "Oh, Andrew is such a gentleman" 

_Toni S.: (11:25 pm):_ alright, im glad

_Shelby: (11:30 pm):_ I swear I won’t tell anyone about this conversation.

 _Shelby: (11:34 pm):_ Or this day.

_Toni S.: (11:40 pm):_ yeah, same

_Toni S.: (12:18 am):_ thanks, shelby.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey guys. remember me?  
> yeah last month university predictably kicked my ass! but im back now! i survived! here's a little 5k to celebrate!  
> anyway uploading 3 chapters in like a week and then going radio silent for a month pretty much summarizes my work ethic.
> 
> thank you guys so much for the comments, picking up where I left off after my exams was honestly pretty hard, but you gave me all the encouragement i needed to keep going on this little project. I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> (also it was very fun to stare at pictures of mia and erana looking for recessive traits lmao)


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